Inside the Times

Published: July 25, 2010

International

SYRIANS SHOW NEW ARDOR FOR A TURKEY LOOKING EAST

The monthly treks of tens of thousands of well-heeled Syrians to Turkey for Western goods is just the latest manifestation of growing ties between the countries. And that already blossoming friendship has solidified since Israel's deadly raid on a Turkish-led flotilla. PAGE 6

U.S.-CUBA ARTISTIC TRADE

Despite little apparent progress in diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States since President Obama took office, members of the Cuban arts community say more musicians, artists, actors and writers are traveling between the two countries than during George W. Bush's presidency. PAGE 8

MASS GRAVES IN MEXICO

In one of the more macabre discoveries of Mexico's drug wars, soldiers have found at least 51 bodies dumped in mass graves after what appeared to be a series of executions by drug gangs in northern Mexico. PAGE 10

CHINA FACES CRITICISM

Human rights groups criticized the Chinese government for imposing a harsh prison sentence on an ethnic Uighur journalist and intellectual who gave an interview to a Hong Kong news publication last August, just weeks after deadly ethnic rioting shook Xinjiang. PAGE 10

National

AS STORM IN GULF WEAKENS, REPAIR SHIPS RETURN TO WELL

As Tropical Storm Bonnie dissipated to a mere area of low pressure over the Gulf of Mexico on Saturday, a drilling rig and about a dozen other ships that had stopped working to repair BP's blown-out oil well reversed course and began heading back to the well site. PAGE 23

DEFICITS FOR TRANSIT SYSTEMS

More riders, aging mass transit systems and inadequate money for maintenance -- a familiar story line for commuters and the people keeping the trains running. What is new this summer is that the problems are making headlines again, in part because of an extended heat wave that has smothered so much of the country. PAGE 17

Official Is Said to Aid Kingpin 17

A Challenge to the Oil Culture 23

Metropolitan

AFTER WAITING SO LONG

Rangel Dropped the Prize

There are several serious questions about Charles B. Rangel's behavior, but why Chairman Rangel would risk the job he had wanted so long for so little is among the more intriguing ones that have yet to be answered. About New York by Jim Dwyer. PAGE 1

A Surprise: Yoga Can Hurt 1

Sports

SWITCH ON HELMET TESTS PUTS HEAT ON THE N.F.L.

The National Football Association's committee on head injuries reversed course and publicly released the results of helmet testing that outside experts described as potentially compromising the safety of youth athletes. PAGE 1

METS LOSE IN 13 INNINGS

One day after showing signs of shedding their offensive difficulties, the Mets reverted to form. The team came from behind to tie the Los Angeles Dodgers in the sixth inning, but that was all the offense the Mets could muster, losing 3-2. PAGE 1

UMPIRE GETS CALL FROM HALL

No statistical equivalents of 600 home runs, 300 wins or 3,000 strikeouts exist to measure umpires by, which might explain why only nine are members of the National Baseball Hall of Fame, including the newest inductee, Doug Harvey. PAGE 2

Obituaries

JAMES E. AKINS, 83

He was the State Department's top energy expert and then ambassador to Saudi Arabia, and warned more than a year before the 1973 Arab oil embargo that oil-exporting nations were poised to restrict shipments. PAGE 24

Sunday Business

WILL ZYNGA BECOME THE GOOGLE OF GAMES?

The outsize ambitions Zynga, the fast-growing maker of Facebook games like FarmVille and Mafia Wars, are all embodied in Mark Pincus, Zynga's 44-year-old founder. He set out to build an Internet icon. So far, he seems on track. PAGE 1

SEEING VS. DOING

As investigators delve deeper into the mortgage mess, they are finding in too many cases that Wall Street firms did nothing when they learned about problem loans or improprieties in lending. Fair Game by Gretchen Morgenson. PAGE 1

MICROSOFT'S POPULARITY

Measured by profits, Microsoft trounces Apple and Google. Much of that profit comes from its success in selling software to big companies. But that hasn't impressed investors as much as new consumer products like the iPad. PAGE 3

Arts& Leisure

FEMALE POP GETS A LADY GAGA MAKEOVER

Lady Gaga is the biggest pure-pop-music star of the day, a mercurial talent lurking beneath an orgy of mirrored balls and bubble clusters and vinyl curtains. And her fingerprints are all over the images of older stars and new ones. PAGE 1

Magazine

THE END OF FORGETTING

Legal scholars, technologists and cyberthinkers are wrestling with the first great existential crisis of the digital age: the impossibility of erasing your posted past, starting over, moving on. PAGE 30

THE YOGA MOGUL

Is yoga about exercise or spiritual meaning? John Friend, the creator of the Anusara school, says it should be both -- and make money besides. PAGE 38

Book Review

ANYTHING TO PLEASE

If you could return as an adult to the staging ground of your youth -- would you? Would it be the grown-up thing to do? Daley Amory, the protagonist of Lily King's third novel, ''Father of the Rain,'' confronts this question. PAGE 11

Sunday Styles

FOR BOBBY FISCHER, THE DRAMA WON'T DIE

The chess champion Bobby Fischer's estate is disputed by a Japanese woman who claims she was his wife, a Filipino woman who claims she is the mother of his only child and two estranged nephews who will inherit his money if neither woman can prove her claim. PAGE 1

Tracing Prep, Forward and Back 1

Modern Love: the Older Woman 6

Automobiles

A SEDAN BUILT FOR COMFORT

Toyota has refocused the 2011 Avalon as a car aimed at buyers who aren't looking for an ultimate driving machine or a car engineered like no other in the world. The Avalon is for buyers who want a comfortable isolation chamber for the commute. PAGE 1

Week in Review

RACE IS STILL TOO HOT TO TALK ABOUT

It might have been hoped that the election of a black president would somehow make the subject of race less sensitive and volatile. But recent events have made clear that racial dialogue is still characterized by cable-TV conflagration. PAGE 1

Editorial

FEAR OF FREEDOM

The Obama administration should not deliver Guant?mo prisoners to governments that have a record of torture and lawlessness, like Algeria. WEEK IN REVIEW, PAGE 7

TOYOTA STILL DOESN'T GET IT

Toyota has repeatedly failed to report potentially deadly problems to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. This must change.

WEEK IN REVIEW, PAGE 7

Online

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